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Destination Imagination
Destination: Imagination is the second 90-minute, three episode length movie in the series Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. The movie debuted on November 27th, 2008 (Thanksgiving Day in the USA) on Cartoon Network at 8 PM ET/PT. Plot Frankie, ever the caretaking friend to the imaginary friends at the Foster's Home, becomes thoroughly disgusted with being bossed around by Mr. Herriman day by day. However, one day, a mysterious locked-and-chained-up toy box arrives at the door with a letter that explicitly states that 1) an imaginary friend is inside the box and 2) the box must NOT be opened at any point ("Imaginary Friend Inside. DO NOT OPEN!"); despite Frankie's protestations, she is ordered by Herriman to take the box up to the attic. The box is taken up to the attic, and against the instruction of both Herriman and the letter-in-tow, she decides to open the box and take a peek inside (she initially the unusually-deep box, only to accidentally fall into the box, which she realizes is a world in itself. She also hears a child-like imaginary friend's voice from nowhere, and from that point, she explores this world-in-a-box, one that is filled with (living) toys, crayons, sumptuous delicacies and visual beauties, with this new friend; her friend, who has dwelt in this world alone after being shipped by its kid's family (depicted as a prologue earlier in the film) to Foster's Home, takes to her and sympathizes with her real-world plight. She promises to return the next day, and it soon becomes a routine for her to fulfill her tiring job and then take a dive inside the toy box to take a load off and be treated like royalty. However, one day, she is about to leave for the real world, but then the imaginary friend (who also controls everything in the world in the toy box) locks the doors and windows of the castle in which she was staying for the afternoon. Mac (in a sleepover with Bloo at the Home), along with Wilt, Coco, and Eduardo ponder the whereabouts of Frankie, as she hasn't made her tasty French toast breakfast. A furious Mr. Herriman bounces to the attic to find Frankie, only to see the toy box's chains broken; he then bounces out, threatening to hand her a pink slip of termination to Frankie. Left in the attic, Mac and the others look for Frankie, only to find that the toy box is not only alive, but ticklish; they then tickle it to open the lid, and then fall inside as well to find Frankie. They then wander into a town in the world, only to find that none of the toys recognize their queries about Frankie. They are then pursued by knockaround-toy police to a river of hollow balls, into which they fall after a long battle with the police. They float down the river, but are then pulled under by a large glove-covered hand. The hand, they realize, belongs to a tall, handsome Robin Hood-esque hero figure who talks in an older form of Shakespeare-style English tongue. The Robin Hood-like figure, who yells "Excelsior!" as a battle cry, repeatedly tries to warn the group away from pursuing their quest as he follows them through different, trying environments that the group overcomes. After a flight from clay-gunk zombie copies of themselves that come to life, they eventually end up at the home of a stuffed toy dog who feigns kindness but then feeds them crumpets that are dusted with sleeping powder (which he presents to them as powdered sugar). Unbeknownst to the toy dog, they were all tied to their traps but Mac (who is prohibited from eating sugar) fools him by a clay gunk zombie copy of him and didn't get tied up, but then the toy dog's face slips off of the dog and onto the body of a stuffed squirrel, who then comes to life. The group realizes that the face is also that of the leader of the knockaround police earlier in their excursion, as well as that of the "Excelsior" guy and the toy dog; the face can also animate anything that he slips onto. Capturing the face on an apple that is held onto by Mac (the face can't move to another body as long as he is held by Mac away from other objects, and Mac is off-limits to the face since Mac already has a face), the group then moves the apple to a nearby desert of burning-hot sand and leaves him there. The apple dries up, but then a group of toy horses gallops by; the face on the apple then calls out to a stray horse that then attempts to eat the apple, only to become the new courier of the Face. The horse, now possessed by the Face, then gallops to the castle, and the Face slips off through several different objects until he ends up at the tallest spire where Frankie is staying; satisfied that Frankie hasn't left, he leaves for the lower area. The horse, which is really the disguise of Mac and the group, then runs to Frankie's room, only to find her on a flat bed with a faceless muscled masseuse massaging her back. They plead to Frankie to return with them to the real world, but Frankie takes their pleas as acts of selfishness akin to Mr. Herriman's demands, and then kicks them out. The group is then gassed to sleep by the Face, who possesses the figure of a sorcerer. Waking up, the group finds itself back in the attic, and Mac despairs over Frankie's words while the group wanders downstairs to their rooms. However, they soon realize that they are not in the real Foster's, and Mac is made aware of this when he sees a giant green eye peering into the attic window. Running downstairs, the group is tossed around by the house as it is moved topsy-turvy; when it stabilizes, the group opens the door of the house, only to realize that they have been shrunk and deposited into a miniature version of the Foster's House. Frankie, who is enamored with the world that the Face has built (which she already knows to be the animator of toy figures), is disturbed from her observations by tiny, squeaky voices. Afraid that she may find out, the Face tries to coax her away from the miniature Foster's House, but a paperplane flies into her head; picking it up, Frankie finds the miniature group inside. The Face then becomes fiercely angry at her discovery, accusing her of having made up her mind to leave him alone in the toy box, recounting the similar situation that resulted in the toy box being sent to the Foster's House in the first place; Frankie rejects the accusation, calming him into unshrinking Mac, Bloo and the group and making friends with them. Suddenly, an angry Mr. Herriman hops into the room, having came in after being nagged by the other Foster's residents to fulfill Frankie's duties; Herriman then verbally chastises the Face, threatening to drag Frankie and the others out of the toy box and leaving the face alone to think about his actions. Distraught, the Face's world crumbles as he pursues Herriman, Frankie and the rest; after a long and heard retreat, all but Frankie make it out of the toy box as the Face, as a dragon with a dump-truck jaw, seemingly "eats" Frankie. Frankie, however, emerges out of the box with minor bruises, and then pleads with the group to let the Face out of the box. A bitter argument ensues between Frankie and the rest, but then Mr. Herriman consents to her opening the box, cracking a very-rarely-seen (and very-forced) smile. The group then lets her open the box, and a very frightened Face (with whom she negotiated her release in return for his release) emerges. The Face soon adapts to the outside world, and Frankie knits him a new permanent (stuffed) body; the residents also agree to cooperatively take care of cleaning and caretaking affairs for Frankie so that she can have a temporary respite from her duties, and all the residents soon join Frankie, the Face, and Mac in jumping into the toy box world. In the credits, Madame Foster shows up at the door, refreshed from her vacation but wondering where everyone is. Trivia * There was a misunderstanding between the script and the closed captioning. According to Keith Ferguson, the actor who voices Bloo, a line as face was destroying his world was read as "You peeved him off, that's what happened." Vitac, the closed captioning group that produced the captioning, read the line as "You pissed him off, that's what happened!" For that reason, along with the darker tone of the story, written by Lauren Faust and Tim McKeon, this episode was rated TV-PG. Faust explained this misunderstanding at Sparky Reid's "Never Forgotten" boards at fosters-home.com, a fan site for the show under her board name "girl_named_goo". * We see Herriman show respect for Frankie and even smile for the first time. * According to the credits, the face's name is "World". * When we see Frankie wearing her hair in an upswept do and a gold dress, it's a reference to Walt Disney's Beauty and the Beast character Belle. * As Frankie (and later, the others) fall down into the world within the toybox, this is a reference to the story Alice in Wonderland, where the lead character falls down a rabbit hole to begin her adventures. * When Mac said "There must be another way back, like in this wardrobe!", this was a refrence to "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe".